The Blackwell Companion to Globalization

Edited by

George Ritzer

The Blackwell Companion to Globalization

The Blackwell Companion to Globalization

Edited by

George Ritzer

© 2007 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd

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First published 2007 by Blackwell Publishing Ltd

1 2007

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

The Blackwell companion to globalization / edited by George Ritzer.p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.ISBN 978-1-4051-3274-9 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Globalization. I. Ritzer, George.

JZ1318.B615 2007303.48′2–dc22

2007001203

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Contents

List of Illustrations viiiNotes on Contributors x

IntroductionGeorge Ritzer 1

PART I: INTRODUCTION 15

Introduction to Part IGeorge Ritzer 16

1. Globalization in Hard Times: Contention in the Academy and BeyondAnthony McGrew 29

2. What Is Globalization? Roland Robertson and Kathleen E. White 54

3. The Cultural Construction of Neoliberal GlobalizationRobert J. Antonio 67

4. Globalization: The Major PlayersGeorge M. Thomas 84

5. Globalization TodayJohn Boli and Velina Petrova 103

6. Theories of Globalization William I. Robinson 125

7. Studying Globalization: Methodological IssuesSalvatore Babones 144

8. Cosmopolitanism: A Critical Theory for the Twenty-fi rst CenturyUlrich Beck 162

PART II: THE MAJOR DOMAINS 177

Introduction to Part IIGeorge Ritzer 178

9. The End of Globalization? The Implications of Migration for State, Society and Economy Subhrajit Guhathakurta, David Jacobson and Nicholas C. DelSordi 201

10. Globalization and the Agrarian WorldPhilip McMichael 216

11. Globalization and the Environment Steve Yearley 239

12. Cities and Globalization Michael Timberlake and Xiulian Ma 254

13. The Sociology of Global Organizations Stewart Clegg and Chris Carter 272

14. Economic Globalization: Corporations Peter Dicken 291

15. Outsourcing: Globalization and BeyondGeorge Ritzer and Craig Lair 307

16. Globalization and Consumer Culture Douglas J. Goodman 330

17. Cultural Globalization John Tomlinson 352

18. Globalization and Ideology Manfred B. Steger 367

19. Media and Globalization Douglas Kellner and Clayton Pierce 383

20. Globalization and Information and Communications Technologies: The Case of War Howard Tumber and Frank Webster 396

21. Political Globalization Gerard Delanty and Chris Rumford 414

22. Globalization and Public Policy Tim Blackman 429

vi contents

23. Religion and Globalization Peter Beyer 444

24. Globalization and Higher Education Peter Manicas 461

25. Sport and Globalization David L. Andrews and Andrew D. Grainger 478

26. The Fate of the Local Melissa L. Caldwell and Eriberto P. Lozada Jr 498

27. Public Health in a Globalizing World: Challenges and OpportunitiesFarnoosh Hashemian and Derek Yach 516

PART III: MAJOR ISSUES AND CONCLUSIONS 539

Introduction to Part IIIGeorge Ritzer 540

28. Globalization and Global Inequalities: Recent TrendsGlenn Firebaugh and Brian Goesling 549

29. World Inequality in the Twenty-fi rst Century: Patterns and Tendencies Roberto Patricio Korzeniewicz and Timothy Patrick Moran 565

30. Globalization and CorruptionCarolyn Warner 593

31. Globalization and Sexuality Kathryn Farr 610

32. War in the Era of Economic Globalization Gerald Schneider 630

33. Globalization and International Terrorism Gus Martin 644

34. Resisting Globalization Richard Kahn and Douglas Kellner 662

35. The Futures of Globalization Bryan S. Turner 675

Index 693

contents vii

Illustrations

FIGURES

1.1 Debating globalization 321.2 Modes of analysis 341.3 Normative spaces 461.4 Contentious politics: the remaking of globalization 479.1 Immigration to the United States, 1820–2001 203

22.1 The relationship between education spending and patents 43322.2 Income inequality and prison population rate, OECD countries 44027.1 Detailed conceptual framework for globalization and health

designed by Woodward et al. (1999) 51727.2 Projected deaths by major cause and World Bank income group,

all ages, 2005 52429.1 Historical trends in between-country inequality: 1820–2004 56629.2 Inequality trends for selected high-income countries 57329.3 Inequality trends in India and China 57429.4 Inequality trends for selected East Asian and Latin American

countries 578

TABLES

8.1 Paradigmatic change from a national perspective to a cosmopolitan social science 166

8.2 Sociology of social inequalities in the tension between the national and the cosmopolitan perspectives 168

14.1 Some ideal-types of TNC organization: basic characteristics 30129.1 Economic measures in China by selected regions, 2003 57629.2 Education and health measures in India by selected states,

1998–1999 577

BOXES

12.1 Friedmann’s ‘World Cities’, 1986 and 1995 26112.2 Rankings of 23 of Friedmann’s 30 world cities (from highest to

lowest ‘interconnectivity’), 1991 26712.3 Recent empirically based estimates of the top world cities 26827.1 Our Common Interest: Report for the Commission for Africa

(2005) 532

illustrations ix

Contributors

David L. Andrews is an Associate Professor of Sport Commerce and Culture in the Department of Kinesiology at the University of Maryland at College Park, USA, and an affi liate faculty member of the Departments of American Studies and Sociol-ogy. He is assistant editor of the Journal of Sport and Social Issues, and an editorial board member of the Sociology of Sport Journal, Leisure Studies, and Quest. He has published on a variety of topics related to the critical analysis of sport as an aspect of contemporary commercial culture. His recent publications include Sport–Commerce–Culture: Essays on Sport in Late Capitalist America (2006), Sport,Culture, and Advertising: Identities, Commodities, and the Politics of Representa-tion (with S.J. Jackson, 2005), Sport and Corporate Nationalisms (with M.L. Silk and C.L. Cole, 2005), and Manchester United: A Thematic Study (2004). He has also guest edited special issues of the Journal of Sport and Social Issues, the Sociol-ogy of Sport Journal, Cultural Studies–Critical Methodologies and South Atlantic Quarterly.

Robert J. Antonio teaches sociology at the University of Kansas, USA. He is the editor of Marx and Modernity: Key Readings and Commentary (Blackwell, 2003). He has written widely on classical, contemporary and critical theory. He also has done work on various facets of globalization, frequently collaborating on that topic with Alessandro Bonanno.

Salvatore Babones is Assistant Professor of Sociology at the University of Pittsburgh, USA, with secondary appointments in Pitt’s Graduate Schools of Public Health and Public and International Affairs. He is co-editor with Christopher Chase-Dunn of the forthcoming volume Global Social Change: Historical and Comparative Per-spectives. His research focuses on the causes and consequences of social stratifi ca-tion in broad cross-national perspective. He is currently studying the relationship between economic globalization and domestic income inequality at the country level.

contributors xi

Ulrich Beck is Professor for Sociology at the University of Munich, Germany; British Journal of Sociology Visiting Centennial Professor of the London School of Economics and Political Science, UK; and director of a research centre ‘Refl exive Modernization’ (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft). His numerous books include Risk Society (1992) and Power in the Global Age (2005).

Peter Beyer is Professor of Religious Studies in the Department of Classics and Religious Studies at the University of Ottawa, Canada. His publications include Religion and Globalization (1994), Religion in the Process of Globalization(2001), Religions in Global Society (2006) and numerous articles in diverse journals and collected volumes. His current research focuses on religion among second gen-eration Hindu, Muslim and Buddhist youth in Canada.

Tim Blackman is Professor of Sociology and Social Policy at Durham University, UK and Head of the University’s School of Applied Social Sciences. He is an adviser to the UK Offi ce of the Deputy Prime Minister on neighbourhood renewal. Among his publications are books on urban planning, urban policy, com-parative social policy and health inequalities. He is currently working on a major project looking at the role of performance management in public health across England, Wales and Scotland. His previous posts include Dean of the School of Social Sciences and Law at Teesside University and Director of the Oxford Dementia Centre.

John Boli is Professor of Sociology at Emory University, USA. A native Californian and Stanford graduate, he studies world culture, global organizations, education, citizenship, and state power and authority. Recent books include World Culture: Origins and Consequences (with Frank Lechner; Blackwell, 2005) and ConstructingWorld Culture: International Nongovernmental Organizations since 1875 (withGeorge Thomas; 1999).

Melissa L. Caldwell is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Santa Cruz, USA. She is the author of Not by Bread Alone: Social Support in the New Russia (2004), and co-editor with James L. Watson of TheCultural Politics of Food and Eating (Blackwell, 2005). Her research on food, glo-balization and post-socialism in Russia has been published in journals such as TheJournal of Consumer Culture and Ethnos. She is currently writing a book on summer gardens and personal agriculture in Russia.

Chris Carter is Reader in Management at the University of St Andrews, UK. He also holds a Visiting Appointment with the University of Technology, Sydney, Australia. He travels globally quite a lot, especially in the Scottish winter.

Stewart Clegg is Professor of Management at the University of Technology, Sydney, Australia. He also holds appointments at the University of Aston Business School, Maastricht University and the Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, the Netherlands. He travels globally a great deal.

xii contributors

Gerard Delanty is Professor of Sociology at the University of Liverpool, UK. His most recent publications include Community (2003) and (with Chris Rumford) Rethinking Europe: Social Theory and the Implications of Europeanization (2005). He has edited the Handbook of Contemporary European Social Theory (2005), and (with Krishan Kumar) Handbook of Nations and Nationalism (2006).

Nicholas C. DelSordi is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Sociology at Arizona State University, USA. He is currently working on a dissertation that ana-lyzes the ethnic, cultural and structural integration of Mexican Americans in the United States and migrant groups in Europe from a global comparative/historical perspective. His general research covers issues of immigration, ethnicity and glo-balization, and how class polarization is implicated with broader global processes. He is also conducting research on the political participation and modes of incorpo-ration among recent immigrants in the south-west.

Peter Dicken is Emeritus Professor of Geography in the School of Environment and Development at the University of Manchester, UK. He has held visiting academic appointments at universities and research institutes in Australia, Canada, China, Hong Kong, Mexico, Singapore, Sweden and the United States and lectured in many other countries throughout Europe and Asia. He is an Academician of the Social Sciences, a recipient of the Victoria Medal of the Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers) and of an Honorary Doctorate of the University of Uppsala, Sweden. He has served as a consultant to UNCTAD and to the Commission on Global Governance as well as to private organizations. He is recognized as a world authority on the geography of economic globalization through his extensive contributions to leading international journals and books and, especially, through his internationally acclaimed book, Global Shift: Reshaping the Global Economic Map in the 21st Century (4th edn, 2003).

Kathryn Farr is Professor Emerita in the Department of Sociology at Portland State University, USA and the author of Sex Traffi cking: The Global Market in Women and Children (2005). Her research interests are in transnational experi-ences of women with violence and feminist understandings of gender-based violence.

Glenn Firebaugh is Liberal Arts Research Professor of Sociology and Demography at Pennsylvania State University, USA and former editor of the American Sociologi-cal Review (1997–9). During the 2004–5 academic year he was a Visiting Scholar in the Sociology Department at Harvard University. Recent books include The New Geography of Global Income Inequality (2003) and Seven Rules for More Effective Social Science Research (forthcoming).

Brian Goesling is a post-doctoral fellow in the Population Research Center at the University of Michigan, USA. He received his PhD from Pennsylvania State Univer-sity in 2003 and was a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Fellow at Michigan from 2003 to 2005. In addition to global inequality, his research interests include the study of health disparities in the United States.

contributors xiii

Douglas J. Goodman is an Assistant Professor at the University of Puget Sound, USA. He has published on consumer culture including Consumer Culture: A Hand-book (ABC-CLIO, 2003) and ‘Consumption as a Social Problem’, in The Interna-tional Handbook of Social Problems (2004); sociological theory including three texts with George Ritzer, Sociological Theory (2003), Classical Sociological Theory(2004) and Modern Sociological Theory (2004); and law and society including ‘Defending Liberal Education From the Law’, (with Susan Silbey) in Law in the Liberal Arts (2004). His current work focuses on the nexus between law and popular culture and he has a forthcoming article, ‘Approaches to Popular Culture and Law’, in Law and Social Inquiry.

Andrew D. Grainger is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Kinesiology, University of Maryland, College Park. His research examines sport’s role in the construction and negotiation of identities – both ‘local’ and ‘global’ – within, and between, Polynesia and the broader Pacifi c. Of particular interest is how the notion of diaspora may be employed as a means of understanding the lives, travels and migration of Pacifi c peoples, and Polynesian athletes in particular, throughout the Pacifi c and beyond.

Subhrajit Guhathakurta is an Associate Professor with appointments in the School of Planning and the International Institute for Sustainability at Arizona State Uni-versity, USA. His research interests include land and regional economics, small industries in developing countries, housing policies, land use and environmental planning. His publications appear in journals such as World Development, Eco-nomic Development and Cultural Change, Urban Affairs Review, Berkeley Planning Journal, Mortgage Banking and the Journal of Planning Education and Research.He has held visiting appointments at the Center for Urban Spatial Analysis at Uni-versity College London, and at the Center for Sustainable Urban and Regional Futures at the University of Queensland in Brisbane.

Farnoosh Hashemian is a Research Associate in the Department of Global Health at the Yale University School of Public Health, USA. Her research focus is on the nexus of global health policy and universal access to quality healthcare. She has worked extensively on health and human rights issues in the Middle East. Far-noosh Hashemian has compiled a two-volume Farsi book entitled The Trial and Diary of Abbass Amir Entezam, Iran’s deputy Prime Minister in 1979 and the longest-held prisoner of conscience in the Middle East. Published in the spring of 2001, the book has sold over 21,000 copies and stirred much political debate in Iran. Most recently, she was the recipient of a Yale’s Deans Award for Outstanding MPH thesis.

David Jacobson is the founding director of the School of Global Studies at Arizona State University, USA. His research and teaching is in politics from a global and legal perspective, with a particular focus on international and regional institutions, international law and human rights issues, and he works extensively in the area of immigration and citizenship. His books include Rights Across Borders: Immigration and the Decline of Citizenship (1996), Place and Belonging in America (2002) and

xiv contributors

editor of The Immigration Reader: America in Multidisciplinary Perspective(Blackwell, 1998).

Richard Kahn is a doctoral candidate at the UCLA Graduate School of Education, USA and is the co-editor of the recent book Theory, Facts, and Interpretation in Educational and Social Research (2004).

Douglas Kellner is George Kneller Chair in the Philosophy of Education at Univer-sity of California Los Angeles, USA and is author of many books on social theory, politics, history and culture, including Critical Theory, Marxism, and Modernity (1989); Jean Baudrillard: From Marxism to Postmodernism and Beyond (1990);works in cultural studies such as Media Culture and Media Spectacle; a trilogy of books on post modern theory with Steve Best; a trilogy of books on the Bush admin-istration, including Grand Theft 2000 (2001); and his latest book Media Spectacle and the Crisis of Democracy (2005). His website is at http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/kellner/kellner.html.

Roberto Patricio Korzeniewicz is Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Maryland, USA and Professor Titular at the Escuela de Política y Gobierno of the Universidad Nacional de San Martín, Argentina. He co-edited (with William Smith) Latin America in the World-Economy (1996), and Politics, Social Change, and Economic Restructuring in Latin America (1997). His articles have appeared in the American Journal of Sociology, Comparative Studies in Society and History,Desarrollo Económico, Economic Development and Cultural Change, HispanicAmerican Historical Review, Latin American Research Review and Revista Mexi-cana de Sociología. His current research focuses on global income inequality and on social movements in Latin America.

Craig Lair is a doctoral candidate at the University of Maryland, USA. Craig attended Arizona State University where he received the John D. Hudson Memorial Award for the Outstanding Graduate in Sociology. Craig’s general inter-ests include social theory, the sociology of work and the social processes of indi-vidualization. He is currently working on a project with George Ritzer on the sociology of outsourcing. His dissertation will concentrate on the outsourcing of intimate matters. Craig has co-authored a number of pieces for edited volumes dealing with such topics as the labour process of computer programming fi rms and the relevance of the McDonaldization thesis to service work. He has also published work on the relationship between communication technology and social relationships.

Eriberto P. Lozada Jr is Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Director of Asian Studies at Davidson College in North Carolina, USA and the author of GodAboveground: Catholic Church, Postsocialist State, and Transnational Processes in a Chinese Village (2002). He has also published articles on his research on globali-zation and its impact on food and popular culture, various issues in science and religion, and is currently exploring the relationship between sports and civil society in China and the United States.

contributors xv

Xiulian Ma is a doctoral student in sociology at the University of Utah, USA. She earned a Master’s degree in Mass Communications and Journalism at Remin Uni-versity of China in 2000. She is also a journalist, having worked for China’s TheEconomic Daily from 2000 to 2002, winning the China News Award (‘Zhongguo Xinwenjiang’) in 2002, for her coverage of rural communities’ poverty and related policy issues in Yan’an.

Anthony McGrew is Professor of International Relations at the University of Southampton, UK and Head of the School of Social Sciences. He has held Visiting Professorships at Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto; Trinity College, Dublin; the Australian National University, Canberra; and the Centre for Global Governance, London School of Economics. Research interests embrace globalization, global governance (with particular reference to issues of accountability and democracy) and international relations theory. Recent publications include: (ed.) The Transfor-mation of Democracy? Democracy Beyond Borders (1997); Global Transformations(with D. Held; 1999); The Global Transformations Reader (ed. with D. Held; 2003); (ed.) Empire: The United States in the Twentieth Century (2000); Globalization/Anti-Globalization (ed. with D. Held; 2002); Governing the Global Polity: From Government to Global Governance (2002); Understanding Globalization (ed. with D. Held; 2006); and Globalization, Human Security and Development (ed.with N. Poku; 2006).

Philip McMichael is an International Professor of Development Sociology at Cornell University, USA. His research focuses on food regime analysis, global development and transnational social movements. Recently he has authored Development and Social Change: A Global Perspective (2004), and co-edited New Directions in the Sociology of Global Development (2005).

Peter Manicas is currently Director of Interdisciplinary Studies at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa. He has published many books and articles, including A History and Philosophy of the Social Sciences (Blackwell, 1987), War and Democracy (Blackwell, 1989) and most recently A Realist Philosophy of the Social Sciences: Explanation and Understanding (2006).

Gus Martin is Assistant Vice President for Faculty Affairs at California State Uni-versity, Dominguez Hills, USA. He is former Chair of the Department of Public Administration and Public Policy, where he also coordinated and taught in the Criminal Justice Administration programme. His research and teaching interests are terrorism and extremism, criminal justice administration and juvenile justice process. Dr Martin was educated at the University of Pittsburgh’s Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, Duquesne University Law School and Harvard College.

Timothy Patrick Moran is Assistant Professor of Sociology and Faculty Director of the International Studies Undergraduate Program at Stony Brook University, SUNY, USA. His research and writing is currently focused on subjects related to global inequality in its various dimensions and forms. He also writes on issues related to

xvi contributors

the historical application of quantitative methods in the social sciences, specifi cally focusing on global measurement and comparative statistical techniques. His research has been supported by the Universidad Nacional de General San Martín, Argentina, and the Luxembourg Income Study Project.

Velina Petrova is a PhD candidate and Woodruff Fellow in the Department of Sociology at Emory University, USA. Her research interests include development, globalization and comparative democratization. She is currently constructing a system-level analysis of foreign aid for development covering all DAC donor coun-tries since the Marshall Plan.

Clayton Pierce is a doctoral student in Education at the University of California Los Angeles, USA, with a specialization in philosophy and history of education. He is co-author of multiple encyclopaedia articles with Douglas Kellner including one for Blackwell’s Encyclopedia of Sociology on media and consumer culture.

George Ritzer is Distinguished University Professor at the University of Maryland. In addition to globalization, his other main areas of interest are social theory and the sociology of consumption. Among his works on globalization are The Mcdonald-ization of Society (2004), The Globalization of Nothing 2 (2007), The Outsourcing of Everything (with Craig Lair, forthcoming), as well as a forthcoming textbook on globalization to be published by Blackwell.

Roland Robertson is Professor of Sociology and Global Society at the University of Aberdeen, Scotland and Distinguished Service Professor Emeritus of Sociology, University of Pittsburgh. He is the author, co-author, editor or co-editor of many published items, including Globalization: Basic Concepts in Sociology (6 vols, 2003) and The Encyclopedia of Globalization (4 vols, 2006). His current interests are primarily in glocalization, cosmopolitanism and global millennialism.

William I. Robinson is Professor of Sociology, Global and International Studies and Latin American and Iberian Studies at the University of California-Santa Barbara, USA. His most recent books are A Theory of Global Capitalism: Production, Class and State in a Transnational World (2004) and Transnational Confl icts: Central America, Social Change, and Globalization (2003). Pine Forge Press will publish his new manuscript, Theories of Globalization, in 2007.

Chris Rumford is Senior Lecturer in Political Sociology at Royal Holloway, University of London, UK. His most recent publications include (with Gerard Delanty) Rethink-ing Europe: Social Theory and the Implications of Europeanization (Routledge,2005), and The European Union: A Political Sociology (Blackwell, 2002). He is currently editing the Handbook of European Studies, and completing a new book entitled Cosmopolitan Spaces: Europe, Globalization, Theory.

Gerald Schneider is, since 1997, Professor of Political Science at the University of Konstanz, Germany, where he holds the International Relations Chair. He is also

contributors xvii

Executive Editor of European Union Politics and has authored or co-authored around 100 scholarly articles. His main areas of research are decision-making in the European Union as well as the economic causes and consequences of armed confl ict. Recent publications have appeared in European Journal of International Relations, European Journal of Political Research, Journal of Confl ict Resolution,Political Studies and Rationality and Society.

Manfred B. Steger is Professor of Global Studies and Head of School of Interna-tional and Community Studies at RMIT University, Australia. He is also a Senior Research Fellow at the Globalization Research Center at the University of Hawai’i at Manoa. His academic fi elds of expertise include global studies, political and social theory, international politics and theories of non-violence. His most recent publica-tions include Globalism: Market Ideology Meets Terrorism (2nd edn., 2005);Judging Nonviolence: The Dispute Between Realists and Idealists (2003); Globali-zation (2003); Gandhi’s Dilemma: Nonviolent Principles and Nationalist Power (2000); and The Quest for Evolutionary Socialism: Eduard Bernstein and Social Democracy (1996). He is currently working on a book manuscript titled Ideologyin the Global Age: Transforming the National Imaginary.

George M. Thomas holds a PhD in Sociology from Stanford University and is Pro-fessor of Global Studies at Arizona State University, USA. His research and teaching focus on world cultural processes and their constitutive effects on authority and identity. He has a long-term research programme on how religious groups engage global rationalism. He is co-editor with John Boli of Constructing World Culture: International Nongovernmental Organizations since 1875 (1999).

Michael Timberlake is Professor of Sociology and Department Chair at the Univer-sity of Utah, USA. His research has contributed to developing scholarship on cities and urbanization that takes into account social, economic, cultural and political processes operating across national borders, at the world level. He is currently involved in studying global networks of cities through research partly supported by the National Science Foundation.

John Tomlinson is Professor of Cultural Sociology and Director of the Institute for Cultural Analysis, Nottingham (ICAn) at Nottingham Trent University, UK. His many publications on the themes of globalization, cosmopolitanism, cultural moder-nity and mediated cultural experience include Cultural Imperialism (Continuum,1991) and Globalization and Culture (Polity Press, 1999). He is currently writing a book on the relationship between speed and cultural modernity.

Howard Tumber is Professor of Sociology at City University London, UK and founder and co-editor of the journal Journalism. He is author of several books, including Reporting Crime: The Media Politics of Criminal Justice (with Philip Schlesinger; 1994), News: A Reader (1999) and Media at War (with Jerry Palmer; 2004). Tumber and Webster published Journalism under Fire: Information War and Journalistic Practices in 2006.

xviii contributors

Bryan S. Turner was Professor of Sociology at the University of Cambridge, UK (1998–2005) and is currently Professor of Sociology in the Asia Research Institute, National University of Singapore. He is the research leader of the cluster on glo-balization and religion, and is currently writing a three-volume study of the sociol-ogy of religion and editing the Dictionary of Sociology for Cambridge University Press. A book on human rights and vulnerability is to be published in 2006 by Penn State University Press. Professor Turner is a research associate of GEMAS (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifi que, Paris), a professorial Research Associate of SOAS, University of London, and an honorary professor of Deakin University, Australia. Professor Turner’s recent publications include Classical Sociology (1999)and The New Medical Sociology (2004). With Chris Rojek, he published Societyand Culture: Principles of Scarcity and Solidarity (2001) and with Engin Isin he edited the Handbook of Citizenship Studies (2002).

Carolyn Warner is Associate Professor in the School of Global Studies and Affi liated Faculty in the Department of Political Science at Arizona State University, USA, and a research fellow with the Center on Democracy, Development and the Rule of Law at Stanford University. Her book, Corruption in the European Union, is forthcom-ing with Cornell University Press, and her works on patronage and fraud have appeared in Party Politics, The Independent Review and Clientelism, Interests, and Democratic Representation (edited by Simona Piattoni; 2001). Her major work on rent seeking by a religious organization is Confessions of an Interest Group: The Catholic Church and Political Parties in Post-War Europe (2000).

Frank Webster is Professor of Sociology at City University London, UK. He has written many books, including The Virtual University? Knowledge, Markets and Managements (with Kevin Robins; 2002), Theories of the Information Society(Routledge, 2002), The Intensifi cation of Surveillance (with Kirstie Ball; 2003) andThe Information Society Reader (2004).

Kathleen E. White is an educational researcher and consultant in global education. She has been a pioneer in global and international education in the United States and has authored, co-authored and edited numerous items in this and the general fi eld of globalization. She has co-edited Globalization: Critical Concepts in Sociol-ogy (6 vols., 2003).

Derek Yach is currently a Professor of Public Health and head of the Division of Global Health at the Yale University School of Public Health, USA. He joined Yale after a long career with the World Health Organization where he was responsible for developing a new ‘Health for All’ Policy, which was adopted by all governments at the May 1998 World Health Assembly. He established the Tobacco Free Initiative and ensured that the Framework Convention for Tobacco Control (WHO’s fi rst treaty) was accepted by all governments, and also placed chronic dis-eases and injuries higher on the global health agenda. Derek Yach has studied and written extensively about the breadth and depth of health issues as well as the challenges of globalization for health and the new era of global health governance.

contributors xix

Steve Yearley is Professor of the Sociology of Scientifi c Knowledge and Senior Professorial Fellow of the ESRC Genomics Policy and Research Forum at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. He specializes in environmental sociology and the sociology of science and, in particular, in areas where these fi elds overlap. His recent books include Cultures of Environmentalism (2005), Making Sense of Science (2005) and (with Steve Bruce) The SAGE Dictionary of Sociology(2006).

Introduction

George Ritzer

While this essay constitutes an introduction to this volume, it is being written after all the chapters have been submitted (and revised, sometimes several times) and the introductions to each of the three parts of the book have been completed. It is actu-ally more of an epilogue than an introduction; a refl ection on the chapters in the volume and, more importantly, on what they have to tell us about the state and quality of our knowledge and understanding of one of the most important phenom-ena of our times – globalization.

One of the points that is almost always made about the study of globalization is how contested almost everything is, including the defi nition of globalization itself. In terms of the latter, it is interesting how many authors of the chapters to follow found it necessary to defi ne globalization, often in the fi rst paragraph or so of the chapter. That act indicates, I think, that there is no consensus on the defi nition and each of the authors who offered one wanted to make something clear that they felt was not clear or agreed-upon.

If the need to defi ne globalization indicated a lack of consensus, most of the defi nitions proffered used similar ideas and demonstrated more consensus than is usually assumed (including by the authors represented here). Among the terms usually included in the defi nitions offered were, in order of frequency, speed and time (accelerating, rapidly developing etc.), processes and fl ows, space (encompass-ing ever greater amounts of it), and increasing integration and interconnectivity. A composite defi nition, therefore, might be: Globalization is an accelerating set of processes involving fl ows that encompass ever-greater numbers of the world’s spaces and that lead to increasing integration and interconnectivity among those spaces.

A basic distinction among positions taken on globalization, one made several times in this book, is globophilia versus globophobia. In fact, the chapters in this volume, indeed in much of the social science literature on globalization (contrary to what Turner argues in the concluding chapter), are much more informed by glo-bophobia than globophilia. While most of the authors here lean toward the former, it is almost always from the political left (rather than the right), and involves a wide

2 george ritzer

range of criticisms of globalization in general, as well as the specifi c aspects of it of concern to them.

Globophilia is generally associated with a view, the mainstream neoliberal, ‘Washington Consensus’, that tends to be disliked, if not despised, by most of the authors represented here (see, especially, Antonio and his critique of a well-known cheerleader for this position, Thomas Friedman; neoliberalism has pride of place in Steger’s delineation of the elements of ‘globalism’ as the hegemonic ideology in the epoch of globalization). It is generally associated by its critics with economic domi-nation, exploitation and growing global inequality. McMichael focuses, specifi cally, on neoliberal agricultural policies such as the ‘law of comparative advantage’ which has had a variety of devastating effects (for example, de-agrarianization and de-peasantization) on the agriculture of the South. And, it has led, among many other things, to the growth of rural industrialization (e.g. maquiladores) and to the under-paid jobs associated with it that force workers to supplement their wages in various ways. Yearley suggests that neo-liberal policies have led to many of the devastating environmental problems that have faced, are facing and are increasingly likely to face much, if not all, of the globe.

Relatedly, in an analysis of a key economic aspect of globalization – outsourcing – Ritzer and Lair take on a favourite theoretical perspective of the neoliberals, Schumpeter’s (1950) ‘creative destruction’, and argue (at least in the case of out-sourcing), contrary to the theory and its adherents, that destruction is not alwayscreative (for a similar use of creative destruction, see Korzeniewicz and Moran). Thus, in terms of issues discussed above, it may well be that the destruction of Southern peasants and agriculture is just destructive, at least for them; there is little or no construction (save the highly exploitative macquiladores) taking place at least in the South to compensate for the losses. More clearly, the destruction of the envi-ronment is certainly not accompanied by any constructive ecological developments. At a more general level, many of the inadequacies of the theory of creative destruc-tion, at least as Schumpeter envisioned it, are traceable to the fact that it was created to deal with an economic world that existed long before the current boom in glo-balization and it is ill-suited to dealing with new global realities where destruction is at least as prevalent in many domains as creation.

Before we leave globophilia in general and Friedman (2005) in particular, it is worth mentioning, and casting a critical eye on, his recent and highly positive view that globalization is leading to a fl at world. Among many other things, this means that barriers to participation are coming down throughout the world and, as a result, involvement is growing more democratic and the world less unequal (see below; Firebaugh and Goesling). While a laudable view, and one with at least some merit, the fact remains that it fl ies in the face of not only the considerable (although debatable, see below) evidence on increasing inequality, but virtually the entirety of the fi eld of sociology and its study of innumerable structures and institutions that are erected, and often serve as barriers (sometimes insuperable mountains), on the global landscape. From a sociological view, the world is, and is likely to remain, at least hilly, if not downright mountainous, impeding the development of easy participation, greater democracy and less inequality. Among those hills, if not mountains, are cities (Timberlake and Ma), nation-states (Delanty and Rumford), transnational corporations (Dicken), educational (especially higher education)

introduction 3

systems (Manicas), systems of healthcare (Hashemian and Yach), organized corrup-tion (Warner) and so on. Were the fl at world envisioned by Friedman ever to come about, we would either need to abandon sociology (an act that would be welcomed by many) or so alter it to make it unrecognizable.

This view on the continuation of barriers in the world is supported by Guhathakurta, Jacobson and DelSordi who take on the issue of the idea of the ‘end of globalization’ in the context of migration. Some argue that globalization has ended because we have achieved free and easy movement of people through and across borders. Guhathakurta et al. contend, however, that creating borders is ‘natural’ (an essentializing view that is questionable in light of postmodern theory) and the continued creation of such barriers means that we are unlikely ever to see the free movement of people and therefore the end of globalization (at least in the sense they are using that idea here).

In spite of the predominance of globophobia in this volume, none of the authors rejects globalization outright and in its entirety. Rather, their view is that the problem lies not in globalization per se, but in the way globalization currently oper-ates. There is a widespread sense that globalization is with us for the foreseeable future, if not forever (it is often portrayed here as ‘inevitable or ‘inexorable’; see, for example, Steger), so the issue is one of what is needed in order to create a ‘better’ form of globalization. For example, the problems of globalization are often associ-ated with its economic1 aspects (usually accorded pride of place in the process) and, more specifi cally, its domination by capitalism. Capitalism, by its very nature, is seen as leading to various problems such as global inequality and exploitation. Thus, for some, the answer lies in the creation of a different kind of economic globaliza-tion that leads to greater equality, and less exploitation, in the world (e.g. Antonio; more below).

This, of course, bears on the normative aspects of globalization and, as with all aspects of this phenomenon, there are great differences and important disputes. For example, there are those more radical than Antonio who would reject a role for all forms of capitalism in globalization, while there are others, more to the right, who would fi nd his ideas on the sources of a reformed type of globalization far too radical.

But much more is in dispute in the study of globalization including fundamental images of the nature of the subject matter in globalization studies (McGrew), as well as basic theories (Robinson) and methods (Babones). One way of looking at this is to say that there is great richness in globalization studies with a wide range of perspectives, normative orientations, theories and methods to choose from. But another is to suggest that these profound differences, this near-total lack of agree-ment, are representative of a ‘crisis’ that can only be resolved through a paradig-matic revolution and the creation of a new paradigm not only for the study of globalization, but for the social sciences in general. Such a new paradigm – cosmo-politanism – is suggested in this volume (and in many other works) by Ulrich Beck who argues that the social sciences (e.g. sociology, political science, international relations) are still locked into older paradigms which, among other commonalities, take the nation-state as their basic unit of analysis (this is also criticized by Korzeniewicz and Moran). Suggested in Beck’s position is a paradigmatic revolu-tion in which the globe becomes the basic unit of analysis (for Korzeniewicz and

4 george ritzer

Moran it is the world-system) and new normative orientations, overarching perspec-tives, theories and methods are created to fi t better with such a revolutionary new focus.

While we await such a paradigmatic revolution, which of course may never come, we are left with all sorts of intellectual differences in the study of globalization. However, those differences pale in comparison to those to be found in work on a wide range of substantive issues that relate to globalization. These include whether there is any such thing as globalization and, if there is, when it began and how is it different from prior stages in the history of the globe. Obviously, by its very existence, this volume indicates support for the view that there is such a thing as globalization, but that is not terribly helpful because under that heading there exist a bewildering array of players (Thomas) and every conceivable social structure and social institution (Boli and Petrova, as well as at least all of the chapters in Part II of this book). In addition, there are all sorts of new players (learning the names of, and the difference between, international governmental organizations [IGOs] and international non-governmental organizations [INGOs] is a necessity) and more are coming into existence all the time. Furthermore, virtually every aspect of the social world, including all social structures and institutions, is undergoing dramatic changes because, at least in part, of globalization. As a result, the global is a near-impossible world to master both because our intellectual tools are inadequate, in dispute and perhaps out of date and because we are trying to deal with so much and everything we seek to analyze is changing, coming into existence and disappearing. Paraphras-ing Marx in his analysis of capitalism, in globalization all that has seemed to be solid is melting into thin air and that which is to be re-formed or newly created seems likely to melt away very soon.

The result of all of this is that everything in globalization studies seems to be up-for-grabs. Much of the fi eld appears to be dominated by debates of all sorts. Let us enumerate at least some of those debates that are dealt with, or touched on, in these pages.

Perhaps the most important substantive debate is whether globalization brings with it more (Korzeniewicz and Moran; relatedly, Blackman wonders whether glo-balization is causing greater inequality) or less (Firebaugh and Goesling) inequality. (Babones both casts light on this issue and seems to suggest that at least from a methodological ground the former are on the stronger footing.)

At a scholarly level, Beck makes the point that the tendency to take the state as the unit of analysis leads to a focus on, and concern for, the relatively small inequali-ties within nation-states. More importantly, this leads to a tendency to ignore the glaring and enormous inequalities that exist at a global level. This is a key reason why he argues for a paradigmatic shift involving, among other things, a change in the unit of analysis from the nation-state to the globe.

Beyond these general issues, inequality comes up in many other ways both in the literature on globalization as a whole and in this volume. A range of positions are represented here including the oft-repeated view that the dominant neo-liberal approach inevitably leads to global inequality (Antonio) and that there is relatively little that can be done about it within the confi nes of that orientation versus what Steger calls ‘universalist protectionism’, which seeks at least a reduction in global inequality (as do, as Blackman shows, various government policies). Then there is

introduction 5

the fact that some IGOs support this unequal system and even serve to increase such inequality. However it is also true that this inequality has spawned various organiza-tions (especially INGOs) seeking to combat this tendency toward increasing inequality.

While there is much debate, there are areas of some agreement on the issue of inequality and globalization. For example, inequality can be seen as a major cause of migration. The poverty in the South and relative affl uence in the North can be viewed as push-pull factors in migration from the former to the latter. Of course, inequalities are also caused by migration as, for example, those that result from the fact that highly skilled and educated migrants are more likely to be welcomed in the North (and virtually everywhere else) and to fare better than their less skilled and educated compatriots (with illegal migrants apt to fare worst of all). Remit-tances home from those who have successfully migrated (to the North) enhance the economic status of some back home (in the South), while others lag behind. The loss by the South of highly trained and skilled workers tends to increase the eco-nomic gap between it and the North. Huge agricultural inequalities, especially between North and South, are being exacerbated by such aspects of globalization as the development of international standards for foodstuffs that adversely affect the economically worse off countries that may be unable to afford to do what is necessary to meet these standards. This tends to worsen their situation and to increase the likelihood of poverty and hunger amidst abundance (McMichael). There are also inequalities between global/world cities and the rest, as well as inequalities within all types of cities (Timberlake and Ma). There are certainly gross inequalities in healthcare between the developed and less developed (especially Africa) world (Hashemian and Yach). Finally, there is the narrower issue of the degree to which sex work draws on and increases inequality (Farr).

Closely related to the issue of inequality is power, especially the unequal division of power in the globe; the ability of some to exercise enormous power over others (North over South; United States and/or the West over the rest). This is implicit in many chapters in this volume, and explicit in several others such as Steger’s discus-sion of the asymmetrical power relations in the world and the fact that the ideology of globalism is used to support that system.

Technology (and its relationship to power) also gets a great deal of attention here as, for example, in Kellner and Pierce’s discussion of the technologies associated with the global media. (Relatedly, Tumber and Webster detail the increasing role of advanced technologies in ‘soft’ and especially ‘hard’ information war. This emphasis on technology also informs, at least in part, their grand narrative of the transition from ‘industrial’ war to ‘information’ war.) While, as Marcuse (1964) pointed out long ago, technology itself is neutral (in contrast to McLuhan’s [1964] view that the ‘medium is the message’), it is clear that it is being used and controlled by those who gain from globalization to further their gains and to better entrench them in their powerful and enriching position. However, the media and their technologies are also employed by forces opposing the elites. This is clearest in Kahn and Kellner’s discussion of the technopolitics of the resistors of globalization. Thus, the issue is whether, in the end, technology favours the further entrenchment of those who gain from globalization or those who are seeking an alternative global system.

6 george ritzer

Another pervasive debate is between those who see globalization producing greater heterogeneity and those who view it as leading to increasing homogeneity. This issue arises over and over in this book with virtually all of those who address it coming down in the end squarely on the side of the idea that globalization leads to increased heterogenization. This great consensus is a bit bothersome, especially to me, since I perceive a tendency to underplay the degree and signifi cance of homogenization in globalization. Further, I think, as suggested by Goodman, that having to choose sides on this issue is probably the wrong thing to do and a waste of effort. It is probably well past time for declaration of a hiatus on the useless debate between homogenization and heterogenization (especially when the former is usually set up as a ‘straw man’ in the debate). I very much like Goodman’s notions that both homogenization and heterogenization are always involved and that glo-balization, especially of consumer culture, ‘makes people more different, but in a similar way’. Similar viewpoints are expressed by the ideas that ‘diversity takes standardized form’, and at least global consumer culture is a ‘global system of common difference’.

Related to the consensus on heterogenization (even though those who support it almost always tend, self-consciously, to critique any hint of the idea of homogeniza-tion) is the widespread acceptance and use of the idea of glocalization (Robertson and White). Indeed that term, and related concepts like hybridization and creoliza-tion, derive their popularity from the fact that they all imply heterogeneity and theabsence of homogenization). The power of this idea is refl ected in McGrew’s chapter in which he identifi es the glocal as one of the four ‘modes’ of analyzing globaliza-tion. Not only does this serve to give exaggerated signifi cance to this idea, but seeing it as a mode of analysis seems inconsistent with the other three modes identifi ed by McGrew – defensive globalization, post-globalizing and critical globalism – because all of them are much broader theoretically than glocalism. That is, glocalism seems of an entirely different order than the other three.

The rush to accept the glocal position is best seen in the chapters by Robertson and White, Andrews and Grainger, and Caldwell and Lozada. While I think they are too accepting of this idea (Robertson and White even imply that glocalization is globalization), I do think nonetheless that they produce some useful ideas that can help move work in this area forward. For example, Caldwell and Lozada suggest that it is better to see the (g)local not so much as a thing to be discovered, but rather as a set of processes of social change. The issue, then, becomes how to best represent these processes. The focus should be on the processes through which the (g)local is generated; on ‘location-work’. In general, (g)localism is a dynamic, interactive and continually renegotiated process. From my perspective, such a view does not pre-judge whether something is glocal (or local), but rather focuses on ongoing processes that may, or may not, involve glocalization. Or, if it is glocalization that is seen as occurring, the issue becomes the relative mix of homogenization and heterogeniza-tion involved.

Also useful is Andrews and Grainger’s distinction between two types of glocaliza-tion – the organic glocal involving the incorporation of globalized, internationalized sport (and much else) into the local and the strategic glocal which involves trans-national corporations (TNCs) exploiting the local, through either ‘interiorized glocal strategizing’ (global sport coopting and exploiting sport’s local dimension) or

introduction 7

‘exteriorized glocal strategizing’ (importation and mobilization of sporting differ-ences into the local market).

However, my problem with all of this is the continued hegemony of the idea of the glocal (as well as heterogenization), no matter how much more nuanced it becomes as a result of the contributions of Caldwell and Lozada and Andrews and Grainger. As I have argued elsewhere (Ritzer 2004a), the emphasis on glocalization and heterogeneity needs to be complemented (not replaced) by a concern with gro-balization (defi ned as the growing imperialistic infl uences of business, states and so on) and homogeneity. In terms of Caldwell and Lozada’s location work, in my view that takes place in the context of both glocal and grobal infl uences. And, when we look at the conceptual elaboration of Grainger and Andrews what we see there is not just glocalization, but substantial grobalization (in both types, ‘grobal’ sport is ‘incorporating’ itself into, or coopting, local sport). All of this makes the Robertson and White position highly questionable (in spite of their brief and undeveloped recognition of grobalization), especially when they go so far as to say that as ‘a homogenizing force, globalization really makes no sense’. To me globalization makes no sense without examining both the homogenizing and heterogenizingeffects of, the grobalization and glocalization involved in, globalization.

Related to, but more general than, the various global–local issues is the idea that globalization is a contingent phenomenon. In the case of the global/local relation-ship, the contingency is in effect the local (although it is also possible to see the global in contingent terms). That is, the nature of the impact of the global depends on, is contingent on, the nature of the local (and the agents involved, see below), as well as the ways in which the global and local interact. Since no two local set-tings are exactly alike, the impact of globalization will vary from one local setting to another. However, this is far from the only contingency of interest and impor-tance in globalization in general and in the global–local relationship in particular.

A second key phenomenon is agency (the local and agency are directly linked by Caldwell and Lozada; Turner integrates agency into his ‘neo-Malthusian’ approach; but agency is devalued by the dominant ideology of globalism; see Steger) and another important contingency involves the differences among people and therefore the differences in the way they react to, and interact with, globalization. This is consistent with poststructuralist or constructivist approaches to globalization (McGrew) which, in turn, alerts us to the idea that it is not the inherent nature of globalization (if there is such a thing) that is of greatest importance, but rather agents’ highly variable social constructions of that process. Ultimately, what matter most from this perspective are those constructions and not globalization per se. This obviously accords great (too much?) power to agents and their constructions. It also leads to the possibility of constructions that run counter to globalization and ultimately to the possibility of alternative globalizations (see below for more on resistance and revolution).

Much of the preceding discussion can be subsumed under a distinction that appears at several points in this book between globalization from above andglobalization from below. While we need to be wary of all such binaries in this post-postmodern era, especially the gross oversimplifi cations that they involve, it is clear that this distinction is intimately related to important issues such as inequality, power and the global–local relationship. That is, globalization from above clearly

8 george ritzer

favours wealthy nations, especially the economic elites in those countries, as well as the well-to-do in less well-off nations. The poor are exploited across the board and they do not share in the wealth generated by globalization from above. Simi-larly, power is linked to globalization from above while a relative lack of power is linked to globalization from below. And, grobalization is associated, and may be nearly synonymous with, globalization from above, while glocalization is more tied to globalization from below. The local is even more linked to the latter perspective, but it can be argued that the ‘truly’ local is increasingly diffi cult, if not impossible, to fi nd in a globalizing world (in fact, I have gone so far as to discuss the ‘death of the local’ [Ritzer 2004a]).

As a result of these associations, globalization from below describes not only a process, but also a rallying cry and a political programme to be followed by the have-nots in society in order to attempt to create, among other things, an equal, or at least a less unequal, global system. In fact, Kahn and Kellner suggest that we use the idea of globalization from below (or others such as alter globalization) instead of the popular idea (and movement) of anti-globalization. The point that is often made is that people and groups associated with this idea and movement do not oppose globalization per se (hence they are not anti-globalization), but they oppose more specifi cally the current form of globalization dominated by neoliberalism that is exploitative of the poor, the weak and the local of less developed nations.

Another perennial issue and subject of debate is the continuing importance of the nation-state in general, and the United States in particular, in the era of global-ization. Let us begin with the latter, especially in the form of the process of Americanization, since it is directly related to preceding discussions of the glocal and of agency. According great importance to the glocal (or local) and/or the agent leads to a de-emphasis on all grobal forces, especially those emanating from the United States. However, one of the interesting things about the chapters in this volume is the fact that a number of them accord great signifi cance to Americanization. For example, Antonio recognizes (albeit critically) the importance of the neoliberal, Washington Consensus in the process of globalization. McMichael gives great cen-trality to the exportation of American consumption patterns, its agro-business, and the supermarket (to say nothing of the fast food restaurant [Ritzer 2004b]).

Clegg and Carter see much of global business having its roots in the United States, including the global proliferation of America’s MBA programmes and the impor-tance and power it grants to those with MBAs (‘neo-colonial domination of an American educational model on a global scale’), American management gurus (e.g. Tom Peters) and American business ‘fashions’. Clegg and Carter argue, correctly in my view, that Americanization is not primarily about the consumption of American products (Big Macs, Whoppers), but about the global spread of a given way of doing business; a particular ‘system’. However, Clegg and Carter do not accept a totalizing conception of Americanization, but argue that there are other models, and reverse processes of colonization, that lead to hybrid forms of business that refl ect, only in part, Americanization.

Americanization is also important in Kellner and Pierce’s discussion of the media and of even greater importance in Manicas’s discussion of the globalization of the American model of higher education. Warner sees the United States as the global leader in efforts to reduce corruption (many would question this) and in seeking to